Secondary Magic
by shiechan
Summary: Born of a muggle family, Alphonse Elric is more than excited when he gets a letter inviting him to Hogwarts. But if he thought a letter was exciting, wait until school begins. [AU] Several Different Anime Used
1. Diagon Alley

Chapter 1- Diagon Alley

Disclaimer – I don't own the characters. I don't even own the plot my friend does. I own nothing.

AN- I hope you all enjoy this story! My friend wrote it and I'm posting it for her. Please review so I can tell her what everyone thinks! Other Anime characters will also be included, but all main characters will be FMA.

Actual Author's Notes - For those who are curious, current main characters will be from FullMetal Alchemist, Inuyasha, and probably Naruto, Azumanga Daioh, and Fruit's Basket. And very likely other characters'll make an appearance. This is part of a little Pet Project I'm doing over Christmas Break to keep me occupied, so there will probably be other stories focusing on different characters. So enjoy! Or not.

-0-o-0-

"Maple and phoenix feather, seven inches. Give it a try,"

This wand was soon discarded into the ever growing pile, joining about twenty others that just didn't seem to work. The customer, an eleven-year-old boy just about ready to start wizarding school, stood silently in the center of the shop as the owner dug out another wand. The boy fidgeted with his hands, wondering if maybe the letter had been sent to the wrong address, or there had been a mistake of some sort. Maybe he wasn't magical at all; maybe his mother would really have to find a normal muggle school for him this year, maybe--

"Willow, unicorn hair, ten inches," The shopkeeper handed the boy yet another wand, snatching it up just as soon as he realized that wasn't the correct type either. The boy looked down at his feet, not wanting to watch the wand be thrown in with the others.

"Don't worry, Al. Sometimes it just takes a while." The boy looked back to his older brother, who gave him a reassuring smile.

"Easy for you to say ..." he muttered, turning his grey eyes back to the shopkeeper, who had arrived with another wand.

"Alright, here's one. Beech-wood, dragon heartstring, twelve inches."

This one was once again thrown into the pile.

Alphonse wasn't sure just what would happen if he was to find out none of the wands worked for him. He had remembered the elation he had felt when he, too, had received the letter stating he was allowed into Hogwarts. His brother had received it only two years earlier, much to the surprise of their mother, a muggle woman who had only thought wizards lived in fairy tales. Then when he had returned for the summer, Al was amazed by the textbooks and spells his brother had returned with. He had been told that it was possible that he wouldn't be magical at all; that his brother was just lucky, but the letter that had come in the mail a week ago had reassured him that he could also learn how to turn people into toads. Now, among the pile of wands, Al was afraid he'd have to let his brother down.

The shopkeeper returned with another wand, one that looked to be somewhat dusty, as if it hadn't been tried in a while. This did not reassure Al's fears at all. That meant they were down to last resorts, right? "Alright. Mahogany, Unicorn hair, eleven inches."

The sandy-haired boy reached out to grab the wand, and immediately felt this one was special, better than the rest. He flicked it, as he had done with the others, almost expecting nothing to happen. But something did happen. Gold sparks shot out from the end of the wand, causing the tired shop-keepers face to light up. "This seems to be the one," he said, sounding quite relieved.

Alphonse's older brother paid the man in the strange wizard currency they used and grinned as he led his younger brother out.

"That took a lot longer than it did for me," he said, brandishing his own wand. "I only had to go through about five before I got this one. C'mon, we gotta meet Winry at Flourish and Blotts." Al nodded, overwhelmed as they stepped out onto Diagon Alley. There were so many people there ... He unconsciously kept a hand clasped on his brother's arm, not wishing to be lost in the sea of witches and wizards.

Al's older brother, Edward, was a third-year student at Hogwarts, though Al was already a bit taller than him. Or, he would be if Ed didn't insist on wearing elevator shoes. In his two years of being a part of the wizarding world, Ed had gained the top grades in most of his classes. He was a quick learner, much like he had been back in the muggle schools. He had been placed into Ravenclaw, and Al hoped he would follow suit. He had missed his brother the past 2 years he had been at school and was hoping he could make up for it

"OK, we're here. Lemee see the list." The older boy snatched Al's book list from his hands, scanning it thoroughly before saying, "They haven't changed anything this year. That means you can just use my old books." He paused, looking up from the list. "You're OK with that, right?" Al nodded. He was used to hand-me-downs by now; especially clothing that was just as small on him as it was on Ed. At least it wasn't necessary to wear books. "Good. That means we can save these," and at this Ed shook the small pouch of wizarding money, "for some nicer things." Unfortunately, due to the distraction of the money bag, he was soon hit in the back of the head with a text book titled "Modern Muggle Marvels." courtesy of a certain blonde-haired girl.

"What took you so long? I told you to meet me here at one o'clock, and it's nearly one fifteen now!" she demanded, picking up the large text book.

"Getting Al's wand took longer than expected," Ed mumbled, rubbing the back of his head with a sour expression.

"Hi, Winry," Alphonse said, smiling slightly. Throwing something at Edward's head was Winry's usual greeting. Both he and Ed had known the girl since childhood, as she lived just down the street, but it turned out she was magical as well. However, when she received the letter it wasn't as much of a surprise; her grandmother worked at the school as the nurse. They were the ones who had assisted Ed in his first year, helping him find school supplies and such. Edward didn't rely on their help any longer, but the two were still useful from time to time. "Where's your Grandmother?" he asked, noting the absence of the short old lady making fun of his "shrimpy" older brother.

"She's off ... somewhere. She didn't give me details. Probably getting some new medicine and stuff." Winry shrugged, then turned to Ed. "By the way, I have all of your school books. You owe me three galleons." She held out a hand, looking expectant. "So pay up." Edward, who looked none too happy about this, pulled out three of the gold coins and plopped them into Winry's hand, who traded him a large stack of books.

Thanks," Ed grumbled, not really know what else he could say.

"Now we have to look for Al's books, right?" Winry asked brightly.

"Well, actually, I'll be using Ed's books so we don't have to--"

"ED'S books? You mean the ones he scribbled on in the middle of class?" At this point, Ed seemed to have shrunk, if such a feat was possible. Winry gave him a withering glare. "Are they THOSE books, Ed?"

"It's OK, Winry. Really. I don't mind," Alphonse said, not wishing to see if Ed could achieve a negative height measurement. Winry turned back to Al, looking as if she were going to continue yelling, but instead she let out a soft sigh.

"If its fine with you. What else do we need to get?"

The rest of the school shopping had gone pretty well, and without much incident. Al had seen many other people who looked as if they were heading to Hogwarts, some looking just as lost and confused as he felt. Others seemed to be completely fine with all of this, thinking that walking down a street with sales on flying brooms and owls was perfectly normal. Winry seemed perfectly fine with the concept. Well, she would, seeing as how she had grown up as a witch, but even Ed seemed perfectly fine, greeting some people he must have known from school while passing the Quidditch' store.

Alphonse still wasn't sure what Quidditch was, though Ed had described it as "soccer for wizards". That didn't exactly help much. Despite getting many lectures about the sport, all Al could really figure was that it had something to do with flying brooms. Ed had eventually given up, saying he would learn about it at Hogwarts.

Al could hardly get to sleep that night, eager to go to his new school. He knew that school didn't start for another two weeks, but it didn't matter. His first sight of the wizarding world was an exciting one. When he finally did doze off, his dreams were full of flying around on brooms, and turning bullies into toads.

(o)

Alphonse stared at his train ticket incredulously, as if trying to pick up a hidden meaning. There must have been something wrong, why would anybody make a platform 'nine and three quarters'? It was ludicrous! Yet, it said the exact same thing on Ed's ticket, and he didn't look at all worried. Their mother wasn't around to help them out either; she had simply dropped them off at the train's station. Al didn't understand why she did this, but he supposed it might have been because she was a 'muggle', so she thought it best to stay out of magical affairs.

Still, though Al did trust his brother, he still saw no sight of platform 9 3/4. He clearly saw the sign that marked platform nine, and there was a sign just beyond that marked station ten, but there was nothing between them. He slowed down a bit, unconsciously wishing the number would suddenly materialize out of thin air.

"Al! Hurry up!" His older brother shouted, already quite a bit ahead of him. Al quickened his pace; hoping Edward knew what he was doing.

"Um... Ed?" Al asked upon catching up. "Where's the platform we're supposed to be on?"

And at Edward's reply, Alphonse began to seriously consider the fact that Winry had hit Ed one too many times.

"It's right here. You just need to run into the barrier."


	2. The Hogwarts Express

Secondary Magic

Chapter 2 - The Hogwarts Express

A/N - (Shiechan's too lazy to type anything this time around.)

Actual Author's Notes - Hah! Preformatted chapter! Take THAT AIM! Anywho, Inuyasha characters are introduced this time.And any of you wondering about pairings... They'll probably be canon, with a couple of strange crossover pairings thrown in for a small while. No slash most likely, though maybe some one-sidedness from Jakotsu if I decide to throw him in. 'Course, not like I am a big romance writer anyways.

o-(0-0)-o

Upon seeing the disbelieving look on his younger brother's face, Edward decided it would be best to explain a bit more. "There's a charm on the barrier.Though it may looklike solid brick,the barrier actually leads to the platform.We don't have to worry about muggles that way. Just walk through the barrier when no one's looking and you'll be fine." Though Al still looked a bit skeptical over the whole ordeal, he trusted his older brother enough to give running into a solid brick barrier a try. Within seconds, there was no trace of the sandy-haired boy.

Edward soon followed, still finding itjust a bitakward to run into something such as brick, yetfeel no impact. This was simply one of the many things he wished to learn about the wizarding world. No doubt he could find out how the barrier was created through a couple of library trips at school. The school library was where Ed spent most of his free time, trying to get ahead of his classes by reading up on more difficult spells and tricks. He wanted to master all types of magic, to master how to control the world he lived in. He had been like this in his years of learning science, wanting to learn the laws of the world, but magic was much more powerful than science. Who needed beakers and special chemicals when all you needed was a wand?

After clearing the barrier, Edward found his younger brotherwearing an expression that resembled that of a small child's on Christamas day. Al had worn a similar expression on his first sight of Diagon Alley, though Ed had thought that after that, Al might not have beenquite asamazed by the wizarding world. Still,Edward supposed he must have acted like that when he first saw the Hogwarts Express. It really was an amazing sight. The train itself was magnificent enough, but the surroundings were not something that could easily be described as dull. Caged owls hooted loudly from from one perch to the next, several people waved around their wandsto show off a new trick,and (this was probably the part his brother liked best) cats of every shade of the rainbow weaved their way among the pillars of human legs, purring happily.

Edward himself paused for a moment, smiling as he took in the scenery. However, getting a good seat on the train came first in his mind at the moment."Come on Al. We got to get on," Al snapped out of his trance and nodded, following his older brother onto the train.

As it turned out, many of the other students had the exact same idea. Ed had been lucky to find a vacant compartment, despite the fact the train didn't leave for another fifteen minutes. The older brother had, as usual, stolen the window seat, and had already begun his usual hobby of staring blankly out the window, as if lost in thought. At this point he was basically dead to the world, and no one could easily snap out of him, unless they dared to call him "short." Not even Al was really sure what Edward thought about while he stared out the windows, or if he even thought at all. Whatever he was doing, it must have required large mental capacity, as he didn't even notice two other people join the compartment, apparently finding it best to take the first avalible space.

The first of the two was a boy about Al's age with dark brown hair and a splash of freckles across his nose. He seemed to be pretty nervous about going to Hogwarts, and as a result wasn't very talkative. He didn't even bother to give his name. The other was a girl named Kaede. She was a third-year Ravenclaw, the same as Edward. Kaede was a bit more talkative than the boy, and especially enthusiastic about taking Divination this year. Apparently her older sister was teaching the class, and there certainly didn't seem to be a bad thought in her head about her older sister. Alphonse was certainly glad that Edward was zoning off. He had heard Ed saying to Winry that Divination was the worst branch of magic, there wasn't any way to tell what was going to happen that eveningbased on whatwas shown in misty balls and tea leaves. Plus, Al could have sworn that she was staring almost longingly at Edward from time to time.

"So I guess you're Edward's younger brother, then?" Kaede commented, seeming to finally tire of her talk of the magic of Divination. "So what house do you think you'll be placed in?"

Alphonse shrugged half-heartedly. "I don't know," he said truthfully.

"And what about you?" The girl asked, turning on the freckled boy. "What house do you think you'll be placed in?"

"I don't know either. I want to go in Gryffindor, though," he said in a neutral tone, just barely audible over the train starting up.

"Gryffindor, huh? Oh, you're Sango's brother, aren't you? Kohaku, right?" He simply nodded, as if deciding that the conversation was over. There was silence for a while, and eventually Kaede decided that she would go and find where her friends were sitting. Al had decided, upon determining that no one else in the compartment was going to offer a good conversation, or even a conversation of any sort, that he would be better off doing something helpful. He had grabbed a book out from his school supplies, "A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration," and began to read.

It hardly seemed a minute before the food cart came rolling by, offering snacks of every sort. His stomach growling eagerly, he quickly got up to see what the cart offered. However, "Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans" and "Chocolate Frogs" were not something commonly seen at muggle concession stands. Still, he couldn't help but be curious as to what these snacks were like. The only problem was that he wasn't the one who had the money.

"Edward?" He turned back to his brother, who still showed no signs of life apart from breathing. "Um ... I'm hungry but a little short on --" Al sure hadn't meant to use _that_ word, but it caught his brother's attention none the less.

"Who're you calling short!" The older brother turned his head, an expression of pure rage on his face. Height was a very touchy subject for Edward, and Alphonse had absolutely no clue why. He had never really been teased about it quite as much as he seemed to think he had been, some of thethings he came up with were rather ridiculous, and he was only insulting himself in the process.Still, Al knew that he had gotten off somewhat light because of blood relations. Some unlucky people could gain scars from using the wrong phrases.

"I meant money!"Al said, holding up his hands as if to defend himself. "I wanted to get a snack, and ..."

"Oh, right." Seeming to calm down quite a bit, Ed pulled out the small pouch which held the brothers' small amount of wizarding money. "Only one thing, though." He tossed the pouch over to Al, despite the fact that there was only a foot or two between them. Alphonse was hard-pressed to choose only one item off of the cart, but finally his stomach rested on the "Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans." Giving a small "thank you" to the witch, he returned to his seat with the snack in tow.

Alphonse Elric had never believed the phrase "curiousity killed the cat" to hold much truth. However, his views very quickly changed as he had the misfortune to first find the one vomit-flavored bean in the bag. Well, maybe it didn't _kill _the cat, but surely food poisoning was close enough for the phrase to hold some merit.

"You- Your face is so- so priceless!" Edward chortled, clutching his stomach. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he nearly fell out of his seat. This certainly did nothing to help Alphonse's nausea, as he pushed the bag of beans farther away. Thankfully, the other person in the compartment did not find the situation quite as amusing.

"They really mean every flavor," he said, with a small smile spreading across his face. "You really have to watch out sometimes..."

"I'm never trusting magic food again," Al stated, closing his eyes and resting against the back of the seat. Perfect. If all of the wizarding food tasted like barf, then he certainly wouldn't need to worry too much about eating too many sweets. In fact, he'd have to worry about the opposite problem. Starving to death.

"Don't worry, Al. Most of the food is pretty good here, even if the chocolate frogs do happen to hop away sometimes," Edward said reassuringly, finally recovering from his fit of laughter.

"Don't mention chocolate. _Please_ don't mention chocolate."

o-(0-0)-o

Thankfully, by the time the train ride was over, Alphonse had gotten over his previous nausea and even managed to choke down a grass-flavored bean. He had originally believed that it was peppermint flavored, but grass was much better than vomit.Thankfully Edward had managed to keep his laughter to a minimum.

Al, now dressed in school robes,caught his very first sight of Hogwarts while looking out the window. It looked much more like a castle than a school of any sort. It was surrounded by a large lake, and for a split second, he could have sworn he saw a large tentacle sticking out of it.

Alphonsehad anticipated sticking close to his brother when they got off the train,who would know where to go. Instead, almost immediately after getting off the train, heheard someone, a very _loud_ someone, yelling out "First years here!" Instead, he somewhat grudgingly followed the voice, to find it belonged to a very strange-looking man. He towered over the students, literally being twice as tall as a few of the first and second years. As for hair, he had none, unless you included the small little curl at the top of his head and the bushy moustache.

"All first years over here!" He looked down at the group of children that were now gathered, most of them with either frightened or skeptical expressionsacross their faces. "Is this everybody?" he asked, voice still booming despite the fact he no longer need to call across a large number of people. He eyed them all carefully, as if one of them were hiding something important behind their backs. "Well, yes. This certainly looks right. Now follow me." At this,the man straightened up, which was quite a sight, and led the first years off toward the giant lake. Al looked ahead, and suddenly had a very bad feeling. Several small boats lined the shore of the cold, black lake.

-End Chapter 2-


End file.
